What If?
by Clarra-Night
Summary: THIS HAS BEEN DISCONTINUED BUT WILL REMAIN HERE (I'm really sorry). Summary: A different outcome of the battle in Svartalfheim. One that they both must live with.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: I'm not sure how promptly the chapters for this story will be posted, because life is currently being cranky and overstuffed. But the craving for Fanfiction-writing broke through eventually (inevitably?), so I'll be updating this just whenever, though as often as I can. I hope you'll stay tuned xx**

* * *

He could hear them.

A Dark Elf's expressionless white mask met him wherever he turned, and his knives were a blur even to him as he took ancient lives one after another. But Loki could hear the Kursed and Thor fighting amongst black rocks in the distance as if he were spectating a mere footstep away. He knew that Thor would die soon. He wondered if his brother ever knew how it felt to lose an unfair fight.

He felt his mouth twist into a snarl as he wrenched the neck of the last Elf.

The wind flogged and stung every bare surface of his strained eyes, but he stared through it to find the two struggling figures across the black valley. The Kursed's hulking mass dwarfed the surrounding fallen Dark Elf bodies, and was pummeling its mallet-like fists into the shape beneath it. Loki could see Thor's blond head against the ground. Thor's red cloak pooled around him, and Loki shook away thoughts of blood.

Bodies of Dark Elves littered the hard ground like puppets with strings he had cut. Their swords did not even gleam. Loki already knew what to do.

Moments later, he was sprinting faster than he ever had across the gloomy wasteland, clutching a heavy Elf blade and one of their discarded grenades. The Kursed would no doubt be unimpressed by the sword, but Loki would like to see how well it contested against the grenade it had nearly killed he and Jane Foster with merely minutes earlier.

Then he saw the tiny dot of Jane running wildly towards the Kursed. Unlike him, she held nothing, and was clearly thinking nothing as she charged towards the battle between two unearthly beings that could both crush her without ever realising.

 _No plan at all_ , Loki thought. _Idiots._ She and Thor were made for each other then, and would be the death of him.

Or perhaps she was only seeing Thor as she ran. If love made people blunder on without any solid rescue plan, Loki was glad he did not love his brother.

He did not love him as he made himself nearly fly past Jane. He did not love him as he drove the spike through the Kursed's massive back with all his rage, feeling a rush of satisfaction when he felt the blade burst through its chest –

He did not love him as the creature turned around slowly with intent in its empty eyes.

" _Thor!_ "

In the periphery of Loki's vision, Jane was scrambling towards his brother's side, her brown hair whipping across her horrified face. The Kursed suddenly turned its head around to her as she dropped heedlessly to her knees, her back towards the monstrous creature with the sword through its frame.

" _Jane!_ "

She did not even glance behind her at Loki as he shouted, too absorbed in helping Thor raise himself off the rough ground. Both Loki and the Kursed moved towards them, but his knife nor his magic could find no purchase through the thick armour, nor did the Kursed heed him as he desperately twisted the blade buried into its back –

" _No –_ "

Again, there was the sound of something sharp entering someone's body.

Jane's eyes were huge as she stared at the thick spike protruding from her stomach. Blood blossomed through her dress like eager flowers, already wilting and dripping to the ground as she watched. Now two bodies were skewered by the same sword.

" _NO!_ "

Thor's roar cut the air more deeply than his thunder could. Loki saw his face contort with horror, and his own heart twisted.

The Kursed merely stood behind her, expressionless and clutching her shoulders. Something like shock threatened to immobilise Loki's limbs, but he remembered the grenade, now blinking in anticipation on the Kursed's waist. He lunged forward, and, wincing, pulled Jane off the blade. His brother's fresh howls behind him shook his ribs. Jane choked a cry into his ear, and her blood was suddenly trickling warmly down the back of his neck.

He and Thor shielded her as best as they could as they listened to the Dark Elf grenade detonate, turning the Kursed inside out as it screamed and screamed. Loki blinked away the red light lancing the edges of his vision.

"No, no, no, no, no, no, _no –_ "

Loki let Thor grab Jane from him, watching his brother crumble into anguish as Jane shuddered and gasped violently in his arms. Kneeling over her, Thor was trying to speak through sobs that tore his mouth, cradling her tenderly against him as she bled onto his already-red cape. Loki stood wordlessly at Thor's back, suddenly with no idea what to do. They could not save her now. Death would have swooped in mere minutes even if he or Thor had been the one lanced by the Dark Elf weapon. He wondered if this is what Thor had been like when their mother had died, and abruptly it felt like his chest was achingly full.

Jane's face was white, with red streaks staining her chin from retching blood. She whimpered softly, and her eyes were having difficulty focusing on the weeping face above hers. "Thor – I – _Thor_ – "

"It's ok- kay, Jane, shh, it's alr- right." Loki had never heard his older brother's voice so stumbling and tender before.

"It _hurts_ ," She whispered. Loki heard Thor sob as he placed a shaking palm on her cheek.

"But it's _okay_ – " she managed to choke out, almost mutedly.

"I love you," she also managed. "I love you, Thor."

"I love you, Jane." Thor stroked her hair from her sweat-stained forehead. The cold gusts thrashed the dust around them more vehemently than ever, but Thor paid no heed to anything but the dying woman in his arms.

Loki should not be there. Should not being witnessing this moment, too private for even the sky to see. Their quiet crying was too much for the wind to drown out. He felt like he should be part of the dirt or the cliffs, a simple prop in this awful play, not just spectating without any help to offer. How much it must hurt, to still lose the one you were trying to save to the force you were trying to save her from.

* * *

 _She is only mortal_. Thor had told him on the stolen ship to Svartalfheim that Odin had said this.

 _But she has more life in her than many immortals that I have ever known. She has brought more into my life than anyone I have ever known._

 _After all this time, Loki, surely you see why I can love a mortal._

 _Can't you?_

* * *

The two figures before him soon stilled, Jane with death and Thor with simple grief. The wind rose even further. But Thor could have been a marble statue in the sand for all the effect the rest of the realm was having on him. Just eroding, eroding, eroding – tearing away pieces of him until Thor himself would depart.

"Thor"

The statue did not give any sign that it had heard him. Loki did not want to be the one to break the pained wordlessness. But the dark torrents of black dust in the distance were swirling closer, and there were still many more worlds to save from an ancient enemy.

"Thor," Loki tried again, still gently. He stepped closer to his brother's kneeling figure, and crouched next to him. He did not want to see the way death closed Jane's eyes, nor how this must be crushing Thor from the inside out. So Loki stared at a trivial stone by the toe of his scuffed boot as he spoke.

"I'm sorry, Thor," his voice faltered, so he tried again. "I'm so sorry."

Thor finally turned to him. The look in his blue eyes made Loki's heart stop and begin sinking towards Helheim.

"You – " Thor's voice sounded like he had not spoken in centuries. "You brought that sword over."

Loki forced himself to meet his eyes. Trepidation was starting to freeze his insides. "To kill the Kursed," he tried to say, but the storm's breath stole his words, and Thor did not stop giving him that look.

"You – " Thor said again. He did not finish. He did not have to. A horribly familiar shadow was settled in Thor's raw expression as it bore into Loki.

 _He blames me?_

But unexpectedly, Thor said, "We need to leave. Malekith is still on his way to Midgard."

After a moment, Loki nodded silently.

Wind-tossed dirt began glancing off their bare skin as they rose, Thor carefully scooping up Jane's body and sheltering her with his hunched shoulders and cape.

"But first, that cave over there." Thor said gruffly. A cavern yawned in the bleak side of the very cliff they had approached Malekith from. "You cannot expect me to leave her here in the open." Loki heard his voice break as he spoke. Loki just nodded again. His thoughts whirled faster than the oncoming tempest.

 _He blames me?_

Thor was wordless as they sprinted across the dusky plains, shrouded in howling gales and misery. The sharp stones and grit pelting Loki's face and hands were nothing compared to the thick silence between he and his brother.

As they made their way to lay Jane's body to rest, the storm shrieked its glee.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Thank you kindly for your patience, if you're reading this after having liked, Favourited, Followed and/or reviewed Chapter 1 when I'd posted it weeks ago *hug* Life is currently somewhat less busy, so (hopefully) updates will be a bit more frequent for a while.**

 **Also, um, hi. I hope you're well :)**

 **Anyway, on you go.**

* * *

"It's ending."

The air tingled.

"The Convergence is over."

Erik Selvig's voice bordered on awed.

"Can't you feel it?"

As they all surveyed the surrounding damage, Loki knew he appeared almost bored in comparison to the three humans. Loki could detect the undercurrent of distaste whenever Darcy, Ian or Erik looked at him, as easily as he could detect someone's distrust or disappointment. He was familiar with both. He breathed past the harsh odour of burning rubber as he sensed the last portal finally slip closed. As the dust continued settling, he thought of New York.

The city of Greenwich had known kinder days.

It was like it had been subjected to the petty tantrum of a giant. Scars marked its roads, which were littered with overturned vehicles and splintered glass. Several metallic-sounding alarms wailed from nearby streets.

"This is going to take everybody forever to clean up," Loki heard Darcy murmur from the other side of an upturned dustbin, gaping with slightly parted red-painted lips.

Selvig was picking his way closer from across the grey road, followed by Ian. " – fewer human fatalities than we could have hoped for – " Selvig was saying to Ian. Both still looked slightly shaken.

"What ruin lays before us now compares not to what else Malekith would have accomplished had we let him," Thor murmured back. He was still staring at the last spot Malekith had stood before being forced back to Svartalfheim. As if he could feel his younger brother's eyes on him, he glanced at Loki. Before flatly returning to stare at the patch of ground. Uncharacteristically, he hunched his broad shoulders as if the battle had exhausted him. Loki looked away.

They did not expect him to care. Not about her. Perhaps some months ago while serving his sentence in his cell, Loki too might have lied that he would care nothing if Jane lived or died. As Odin himself had reiterated often, human lives are fleeting, barely there compared to his or Thor's. In the eyes of time, it made hardly a difference whether she had died in Svartalfheim or had lived to have her own grandchildren. But Loki knew. He knew what difference it made to Thor, whether she died of old age at the end of her human life or died on the end of a sword that Loki had brought into her reach.

Jane had not been his, and Loki had never wanted her, but the sound and feel of her vomiting hot blood down his back had refused to stop replaying and replaying in his head the moment she had stopped.

After the struggle in Svartalfheim, their time in that Midgardian city had seemed very short-lived to him, almost insignificant.

* * *

 _The sheer number and flickering fleetness of changing portals made Loki's scalp crawl._

 _"_ _We don't have much time left before the alignment," Selvig said. He was clutching several spear-like devices of his and Jane's making. He had claimed they would help fight the unstable effects of the Convergence._

 _Thor turned to Loki, his expression business-like._

 _"_ _You often cheat time and space, Loki – can you not seal these portals?"_

 _"_ _I can transport whatever you want to wherever you need, but I can't stop a Convergence."_ And I can't bring someone back from Valhalla, even if it's what you want and need.

(I'm sorry, Thor)

 _"_ _Then take me to its centre." In the height of warfare, Thor sounded more like himself,_ _but the torn ache of speaking his last words to Jane still lingered in his voice. Loki would never stop seeing pictures of Jane's frightened, dying face in Thor's eyes. "I must stop the Aethr before it passes through_ _–_ _"_

 _Loki shook his head._

 _"_ _Aim for Malekith, not the Aethr, Thor. If you take the devices with you, to him, we can send him away. Your chances at that are better than trying to destroy indestructible darkness."_

 _For a Wordsmith, Loki felt he could have bitten his tongue off. By the shadow that passed over his brother's face, he knew Thor's mind w as replaying their failed attempt at destroying the Aethr in the black wastelands._

 _But Thor only said, "Then after you take me, you need to return here to help neutralise Malekith's soldiers."_

 _Loki nodded. It would be ironic, he reflected briefly, for him to defend a Midgardian city from an alien army._

* * *

"S.H.I.E.L.D. will be all over this soon," Selvig was now muttering to Darcy. "Maybe we shouldn't be here when they do… "

But at least it was over. Until the next disaster from beyond the Earth, Selvig, Ian and Darcy would return to their normal lives studying sciences that only roughly matched the true happenings of Yggdrasil. They were only ever involved because Jane had been involved.

Thor's gaze – now the only clean blue around as gloomy clouds greyed the sky – had lifted from the ground to comb the city like everyone else's. But searchingly, just as when they had escaped from Svartalfheim to Earth.

* * *

 _"_ _Now we must navigate our way back through the secret path we used earlier."_

 _Thor's tone was brusque when he spoke in the rocky cave in Svartalfheim. His eyes had gathered their hardened look from the first time they had settled on Loki after Jane's death. It did not suit him. Thor was never one to disguise pain with coldness. Even in the cavernous darkness, Loki could easily see his heart bleeding raw beneath the icy mask._

 _"_ _No need, Br – Thor." With Jane so newly gone, it felt wrong to call Thor_ Brother _. As if it would sound like he was trying to quickly reclaim his place by Thor's right-hand side. Thor had carefully laid her limp body on the stone slab in the throat of the cavern that would constitute her grave, and there Loki had seen his face crumple with fresh anguish. It had been clear to him his brother had thought he would not see that. It was strange, Thor being one to hide._

I do care, Brother, _Loki wanted to say aloud._ I'm here for you, too.

 _But he did not dare. He was the Liar, after all. What if the contrary was assumed? He could not risk that again. And there were still nine worlds to protect._

 _"_ _We have no more need for that doorway," he said instead. In that cave, each new air current brought a new smell, one from somewhere clearly not Svartalfheim. It was like taste-testing Yggdrasil. With some guilt, he_ _welcomed the change of smell; anything other than the coppery tang of her spilled blood._ _"The Convergence is opening portals everywhere, to different realms. But I should find one to Midgard, since returning to Asgard would be more hindrance than help after Odin's newest orders."_

 _He could feel the_ holes _(like sword wounds) being formed and resealed, in the substance of the worlds. It was like invisible, almost intangible water currents were flowing through each one as it opened (bleeding sword wounds, blood being vomited_ _–_ _), gushing past him (her blood down her torso and down his neck as she whimpered), pushing him, screaming at him that everything was going to tumble apart._

 _He did not allow his hands to shake as he reached outwards with probing branches of magic into the shadows. Perhaps it was more like tossing handfuls of autumn leaves to the wind, feeling them swirl through not just the air but the very fabric of reality…_

 _He felt clusters of those leaves passing through several of those holes –_

 _(The smell of new snow, the sound of cracking ice, of Jotunheim)_

 _(The sound of bubbling molten rock, the smoke smelling too rich to be Midgardian)_

 _(A snatch of aggressive music, the smell of petrol, the smell of Earth's human fumes)_

"Here"

 _–_ _so he took his brother's armoured wrist, as tentatively as their escaping time would allow, and pulled as he ran deeper into the cave –_

 _–_ _feeling the gap to Midgard drifting and pulsating, almost snapping closed –_

 _But the next instant, the air was warm and still, and the ground smooth beneath their feet. The sunlight there was more diluted than Asgard's, filtering through Loki's eyelashes as he peered around. They were in a narrow alleyway, past which Loki could see stone buildings etched against a clouded sky that seemed utterly radiant after the home of Dark Elves. It did not seem like New York or Stuttgart, but Thor seemed to recognise their whereabouts. At least there was no screaming, blisteringly dry storm._

 _"_ _London." Thor attached the name to their surroundings. "We must find Erik Selvig here."_

 _Loki was unsurprised to hear the name of the scientist whose mind he had invaded some time ago. For a human mind, Selvig's had managed to contain the gross amounts of knowledge forced upon it with noticeably more composure than others (before bloating and leaking at the seams just as the others had). Loki had wondered more than once before what state the man had been left in. Apparently he was still at least functioning enough to be of help._

 _"_ _He'll no doubt have something that may aid us in handling the Convergence while we defeat Malekith." Thor said._

 _Loki watched him stare around the bleak city as if the one he wanted to see would oblige him by appearing. But Selvig did not, and nor did she._

* * *

It was over, and yet Loki still could not shed the feeling that time was short. Among other higher beings hidden in Yggdrasil's branches, an angered Odin would be seeking to imprison or execute them, perhaps even with a sword strike to emphasise the foolishness of their plan. Or just Loki – Thor would at least be granted time to help repair the city before his sentence. Loki must plan his next path instead, making it twist and writhe as he himself had in the Void two years ago… And along the way, knock on the gates of Valhalla to try to see Frigga, since he would not get there otherwise. He prepared to say aloud to Thor that they should perhaps decide their next move, but –

"Before you scamper from Earth again for another couple of years…" Darcy's voice was steady, but in the way that radiated the great effort it took to keep it so. "You have to tell us more about what happened to Jane."

Loki watched Thor's face tighten as he pulled back his starved scrutiny of the city to settle on the small, bespectacled woman before him. Thor's eyes reflected the same repressed pain in Darcy's. (Two familiar blue mirrors, never truly able to hold anything back, always giving, giving, giving so anyone could take advantage).

"Darcy, of course I – "

"Not you, Thor." Her stare was tired and rimmed with red. If it had witnessed Jane's body being pierced by the Dark Elf blade, Loki knew her tears would not have yet stopped. But it hardened underneath the film from earlier crying as it turned to Loki.

"Him."

He could feel the weight of Selvig's and Ian's gazes adding on top of hers. Their stifled grief had thickened the air since Thor had told them of Jane's death, and it was getting harder to breathe.

Several ideas of what to say alighted on his tongue briefly, like frail butterflies. His plan had no time to account for Jane trying to interfere ( _But you should have anticipated that, of course she would want to get involved, she loved Thor so much_ ) _,_ he had tried to warn her when the Kursed had turned to her ( _But you should have known she was so engrossed in helping Thor get up, because she had loved him so much_ ), he had been in the middle of _trying to save Thor_ , and could not stop the Kursed in time before it –

( _Just don't try defending yourself at all for this; you loved him too, well done, but she's the one who suffered_ )

(She's really gone)

(And now Thor must suffer)

Thor's expression was as leaden as the others' as Loki scrabbled with his wordlessness. Perhaps Loki was weak enough to indulge in wishful thinking, but maybe there was a slight pleading in Thor's eyes. It exposed the softer parts of his older brother's heart.

And made his disappointment the most terrible.

"I – " Loki began. _I didn't mean to let her die._ It should have been quite simple to say it - a simple truth - and it would never be enough for Thor. The sentence just sat dry and brittle on his tongue as they watched him.

So it may have seemed like a convenient escape of his own devising when he was suddenly engulfed in a blaze of white light.


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry if this chapter was slow in coming! It's a little longer than what I'm accustomed to writing at one time. Also, I'm sorry to certain people for having not yet PM'd them back xx This chapter was a headache to polish off (though that may be partially due to my awful sleeping habits), but I wanted to give it the front seat on my to-do list to try get this story rolling more.**

 **Also, I updated Chapter 2 slightly to more strongly portray what I wanted, about Loki's POV on Jane's death. Little paragraphs and sentences, but it reads quite differently now (I feel). But the same plot, of course :)**

 **Again, thank you for reading this! And if I don't post anything again soon, I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a bright New Year.** **Take care, be happy Xxoo**

* * *

They had watched Loki suddenly vanish into a pillar of light so intense it had looked solid. Thor had heard Ian and Selvig's sounds of surprise, and Darcy's cry of injured frustration. He himself just watched Loki disappear right before he had to explain himself.

In Svartalfheim, the moment Jane had stilled, time had become such a precious commodity they could not afford to waste on her. _Time should only be spent on what could be saved_ Loki might have said (So why had Thor spent so long trying to reach Loki?). But the knowledge that she of all people rested in a cold cave in a dark realm would not stop howling helplessly at the back of his heart, not when she deserved a resting place closer to Valhalla. He wanted space to think about her, and his mother. He wanted time to _grieve._

(She had had more life in her than many immortals he knew. Without her, it felt like his own life should fade away to dust)

And after Thor had told Jane's friends about her death, the closest he had come to hearing anything about Jane was his brother's failed mumbling at Darcy. Loki should have spit out whatever he had been about to say, teetering maddeningly on the edge of his recount of what happened. And Loki's way with words was so convoluted Thor doubted he could have guessed how that tale would have been spun. Like so many times with Loki in past years, Thor was left craving an untwisted truth. Something that had, _for just this once_ , not been touched by a Liesmith – Loki, Director Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D., Loki, even Odin his father, _Loki_. Jane's unsullied honesty – not hardened by war like his Asgardian friends – had warmed his heart while the sting of realising lies had always left him cold.

He turned to say something to Darcy, despite not knowing what. Anything would be better than leaving them with nothing as Loki had just done. Her eyes held a misery in them that he knew shadowed his own. But his lips had barely parted when a second tunnel of white light swallowed him whole.

* * *

When they were very young, he had told Thor once that he secretly savoured the sensation of travelling with the Bifrost. It was the only time he could fly beside his brother.

The first sensation when landing was always the soles of his boots slamming into the ground. When Loki quickly blinked his vision clear, he found himself in a brightly lit dungeon cell, surrounded by near-silence.

His _previous_ cell, before Thor had let him out. The stale air felt like it had not been stirred in a decade. The richly carved table, the gold-framed mirror and the emerald-padded footstool were still in pieces across the white floor, like a devastated collage on a canvas. He saw how the dark juices from over-ripe berries had mixed with his blood from some days ago, staining the pale walls. It tainted the inside of the chamber with the stink of rust and sickly sweet fruit. For a moment, Loki was seized by the memory of the isolated night he was told Frigga had died. Despite the ominousness of his return, the overlapping memories of Jane's fear, Jane's wound… Frigga still scoured terribly at the already chafed patches of his heart.

 _Thor, I hope you made her real sendoff spectacular._ He eyed the pages from books she had sent to him, accidentally torn by his magic and still littered on the floor. _Because her other son clearly gave her a pathetic farewell._

* * *

The second the Bifrost's light faded, Thor hoisted Mjolnir behind his shoulder and prepared to swing at the first person foolish enough to approach. His hatred of being taken by surprise narrowed his eyes, and all his festering anger that he had not managed to lay onto Malekith was suddenly gathering in his grip until his knuckles were whiter than bone.

"The rashness of your past actions still persists in you."

Not the words but rather the sound of that voice – worn yet imperial, and familiar as Frigga's – made Thor pause, though his clutch on Mjolnir would not loosen. He had not forgotten the last time he had encountered Odin it had been in argument over the realm's safety (over Jane's, over how she was not _fit_ to be loved by an Asgardian), and that the Allfather had ordered his soldiers to do whatever it took to detain him. So it must have been just childish instinct that made him hesitate at the sound of his father's rebuke.

Realising he was yet to look around himself properly, Thor dropped Mjolnir a fraction of an inch and no more. He was standing before Odin seated in his battered throne, the rubble from Malekith's assault still dusting the polished floors. The lone eye that scrutinised him was as hard as the gold eye patch beside it, as if it were Loki's trial and not Thor's. Flanking the throne, Sif, Fandral, Hogun and Volstagg were watching him tensely with wide eyes, handcuffed and chains held like leashes by a dozen expressionless guards.

His friends each looked somewhat disheveled, though thankfully otherwise unscathed. Volstagg still stood taller and wider than all of their guards, and Sif's chin was lifted almost regally. Thor recognised many of the sentinels as men who had fought or trained with Sif and the Warriors before. To see his friends chained by the same men scraped against Thor's temper.

 _How could they –_

Almost without thinking it, the tiny distance he had lowered Mjolnir promptly disappeared.

"Do you really think that will do them any good, Thor?" The Allfather's voice interjected again, like one of Thor's own thunderclaps in stagnant air. "They are in this state because of you, and more resistance on your part will only do them worse."

Thor's debt to his friends bruised him easily, and he dropped Mjolnir to his side completely, forcing himself not to hang his head at the words. They must have been so torn between their loyalty to him – to what they knew had been the right thing to do – and their loyalty to the Allfather, to what had been built over the course of their entire lifetimes. If it had been anyone else on that throne ( _Loki_ ), Thor knew they would not be so silent.

 _Forgive me, my friends._ He pleaded to them silently. But though he had none of Loki's talent for reading others, he saw their concern for him raging beneath clenched fists and squared shoulders. Sif's face softened slightly when their eyes met, which only wounded him more.

While Odin's cool gaze stayed trained on him, Thor tried to find hints of his father behind it. Ever since he was a child, he had always been able to do that – realise a compassionate father ultimately was the one delivering cold orders. But there was only the Allfather, not his father, who sat above him now. Or perhaps Thor had simply lost that ability to find him, when kingship asserted itself.

(Those were the only times he could ask Loki _why, Brother, can you not read him as well as I can? You're supposed to be the one who is good at this_ when Loki had not seen any softness in their father's features)

Odin spoke again calmly. "Before we begin your trial, Thor, there are some security measures to be fulfilled."

He gestured with a metal-gloved hand. Before Thor could react, a tangle of thick chains and shackles rose and darted at him like striking cobras.

* * *

Through the transparent cell wall of flickering gold energy, all the other cells visible were empty.

No guards were stationed anywhere that Loki could see, either. He was sure Odin was responsible for this unexpected return, casting his own magic to manipulate the Bifrost. The same cell as before. All sentries and other prisoners relocated so Loki could not as readily use them for facilitating an escape.

 _At least his timing is better than his decision-making._ Odin could have recaptured Loki with the Bifrost anytime during the conflicts in Svartalfheim and Midgard, but had removed him quite immediately after Malekith was stopped. If the Allfather had indeed deliberately waited until then, Hugin and Munin were his likely scouts, if Heimdall was still being kept imprisoned.

 _But in case they are not his only extra eyes and ears…_ Loki let his magic cloak him. The same spell that had hidden him from the Gatekeeper while he had spun his lies to Laufey. With that, Loki then picked up a diamond-shaped mirror shard, touching the glassy surface with the tip of his finger. It rippled like water, before his reflected green eye was replaced by an image that was of nothing in that cell.

On the shard's scratched surface, Loki could see Odin's throne room, lined with golden light from the sundown. Testament of Malekith's attack was still evident – chunks of walls were missing, and pillars were crumbling themselves onto the floor so it was reminiscent of a gold version of Svartalfheim's dusky sands. Odin, in his steely armour plates, still sat upon his ruined throne, ignoring the tattered state of his kingdom. He was glaring down at five figures before him, but Loki could see even at a distance the weariness in his single eye.

Thor, Sif, Volstagg, Fandral and Hogun were surrounded by nearly as many guards that had surrounded Loki during his trial. Heavy chains draped the five, like they were caught in the same steel spider web. Sif and the Warriors Three each appeared as though they had been scuffling. The sight of them standing below an unsympathetic Odin was something Loki thought he would never see. He might have smiled at that, if only a weak smile empty of any mirth.

One drawback to scrying was the complete muteness of it. Loki examined the scene unfolding, ignoring the pointlessly silent stirring of people's lips and instead studying their whole faces and forms. Atypically, none of Thor's friends seemed to protest as Odin spoke. They stood wordlessly for the longest time, only listening. Another sight Loki had not encountered before. Thor also did not appear to speak, or even barely move as he stood with his back straight like a proud soldier's. But his shoulders looked heavy with hidden anguish, like he still carried Jane through the dust storm.

( _You cannot expect me to leave her here in the open_ )

Loki doubted they would be joining him in the dungeons. Odin knew their heads and their hearts served Asgard, if not always the king – they would be put to work repairing the city, not locked away to stop them wreaking havoc. That would be more Loki's punishment.

In the fragment of glass, the figures began walking. They formed a rigid, steel-laced parade, tailed by guards and led by Odin with Gungnir pointing the way. The protective hunch to Thor's shoulders did not lessen as he moved. Without its king, the throne room looked especially decrepit. Loki continued to survey the mirror surface for an extra minute in case they returned, then cut off the scrying spell. When his green eye stared back at him again, he let the shard fall to the floor.

The next minute, a metallic clinking and rhythmic parade of hard footfalls began descending the dungeon stairwell, echoing in the deep underground. Loki arranged his features into that of masked confusion, turning to face outwards and watch their march like a spectator at a strange wedding or funeral.

The tip of the gold spear came into view first, through the glowing pane. Ignoring Odin and the others, Loki sought Thor's gaze avidly, trying to apologise wordlessly as if that would mean anything. To not let break the weakening link between them, which, it seemed, Loki had only managed to form after attacking Midgard so that he could break it again by failing. Just as before, Thor met his searching stonily, and then the glints of clear blue was gone too quickly. It felt like something suddenly shifted in Loki's chest, heavier than guilt. For all his foresight and planning and experiences, he had never mastered how to prepare for this kind of loss.

In the periphery of his vision, Sif and the Warriors Three swiftly hid their surprised curiosity as they took in the destroyed contents of his cell.

"Both of the men whom I had once proudly called my sons – " Odin began.

"Liar," Loki let himself murmur absently, loud enough for Odin to barely hear.

" – fit to spend the rest of their lives in prison." Odin continued over him, though Loki did not miss Odin's eye narrowing coldly at the word.

"Perhaps your parenting techniques are just a bit off." Loki replied in a normal volume, with a barbed tone. This was also ignored, except for the slightest tinge of disgust in Thor's friends' expressions. But even then, Loki knew their devotion to the Allfather had diluted somewhat since they had smuggled Jane from Asgard.

"I had thought Thor at least would be the saving grace – "

 _Finally some honesty_ , Loki thought. It somehow seemed like Thor was looking away, despite barely looking at Loki at all.

"But… I know he still values the lives that thrive in the Nine Realms above all else – "

Beside Odin, whilst staring at an empty nearby cell, Thor's jaw was tensing, and his brow furrowed in fresh pain, the faintest amount. Loki stopped himself from drawing his eyebrows together in response, but felt his own fist tighten behind his back. One of the very few things he could pride himself on was his skill in hiding all true emotion, and yet sometimes the simplest expressions of hurt on Thor's part could prick holes in those masks he created.

 _Does Odin know about Jane?_ Loki pretended he, like the others, had not noticed Thor's reaction to Odin's words. That Thor had been reminded that he had lost something he valued above all else. Not that Thor could forget.

" – and that Asgard needs him despite the treason you both committed against her. Therefore," Odin paused for a weighted second. "Thor and his friends will be kept under special watch, and will go free."

 _And obviously I will not._

"But I cannot risk another prison escape."

 _Now here the catch comes._

"Loki, your earlier sentence of eternal imprisonment still stands, but not in Asgard. I have another place in mind for you."

Loki knew that boded ill for him. But he could only imagine the relief of leaving the grief-ridden cell, and the shame of leaving Thor with such a grief-ridden heart.

* * *

Loki was standing at the edge of the Rainbow Bridge.

His thin wrists, ankles and throat were fettered, his chains leading to the hands of several silent guards. They stood back, giving a wide berth to Loki and Odin, who stood at Loki's shoulder like simply a chastising parent. To Thor, it made Loki look small, and alone. The Bifrost loomed darkly against the indigo sky.

Loki was not speaking. He must be not struggling now because the cuffs were designed to restrict magic-use, but Thor wondered why he had not earlier. Perhaps because Odin may have ordered an execution instead if he fought too bravely. Loki had shouted at him once on Midgard _I have seen worlds you've never known about!_ If he had survived unexplored parts of the universe beyond the Bifrost before, possibly he assumed he could just handle it again.

( _I have grown, Odinson, in my exile,_ Loki had smiled in the dark)

The Allfather's punishment could even provide the escape, not imprisonment, that Loki must have longed for – from Asgard, from duty, from more blame.

Thor, Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg and Sif watched Loki and the Allfather from behind, under the eyes of their crowd of guards. They were also still hung with chains, the manacles rubbing redness into the skin of their wrists and ankles. Thor may have found them burdensome, if he could not let go the feeling that he was cradling the weight of someone else with him. Or someone whom he could never be with.

("It _hurts_ "

Thor could not ease this memory of her suffering.

"But it's _okay_ – ")

But these chains did not extend over his heart anyway.

If they went back in time, back to when the bridge did not make Thor think of someone falling (and the person whom he had been cut off from), Thor thought perhaps he might admire how beautiful the sky looked that evening. As it were, he had just stared wordlessly at Loki's back as Loki had paced in front, beside Odin, towards his exile.

While they had walked the bridge, it had reminded Thor unwillingly of dreams he had had the first time Loki had fallen from the bridge. In them, the bridge's surface had seemed so slippery that he could not catch up to stop Loki sliding off its broken end.

But… in the time after Loki's first fall, Thor knew from Heimdall that the other half of that disaster was alive, and thriving, and searching for him. It had consoled Thor, with Loki gone – at least Jane had lived through all that. When she had not been by his side, she had always been out there somewhere, waiting for him to find her, even if it took two years. And he was still struggling to grasp the reality that that was no longer possible.

Odin had slammed Gungnir against the glassy bridge, declaring something Thor found himself not quite registering. A strong light had flashed, and the air had pulsed with the Allfather's power. When Thor watched the black-clothed figure disappear over the edge a second time, the tears that warmed his eyes were not for Loki.

* * *

So that was why Thor, Sif and the Warriors Three had been brought to witness his sentence before theirs was carried out. The Allfather intended to show them Loki would be forever unreachable. No longer an option to breakout for future assistance. Most probably to emphasise that point, they had been brought to witness his exiling too.

But Loki had no time to think about that as he plummeted. The first time he had experienced this drop, he had been looking up at the Allfather and Thor, pleading silently for them to _understand_ what he had done. Odin had looked disappointed – Loki recalled feeling disbelief beneath his desperation back then, that his father still reserved only one expression for him even after all that time. Thor had looked distraught, and Loki had heard his brother scream after him as he was swallowed by the churning darkness.

This second time, before Odin's magic had thrown him off the Rainbow Bridge, he had ignored the Allfather to beseech Thor wordlessly to understand what he had done.

(What he had _not_ done, to help her, to save her from the fall)

Thor's face. It was not panicked like before, and had made that heavy feeling tighten sorely inside Loki again. Because the last time Loki had experienced this drop, Thor had at least had Jane.

No, he had no time to dwell on this either.

He fell in whirling tumbles, like a leaf lost in a colossal storm. His feet were flipped again and again over his head in endless series of spine-cracking acrobatics. His coat tails whipped his face and his neck. The whole while, everything became increasingly, impossibly dark. The gloom was so thick Loki was surprised he could still breathe in it.

He knew what Odin was doing. Loki had read about the strange rifts in time and space that formed between Yggdrasil's branches. In them, the pace of time always diverged from that of time where the fabric of Yggdrasil was whole and smooth, like in the Nine Realms. Apparently, the space inside the creases also differed – in some, there was plenty, or just slightly less than the normal regions of the universe. Some of them contained no space at all, and anything that unluckily entered would be crushed to nothing. No news of their use as a prison had been heard before. But Loki would be unsurprised if, when the Allfather had to trial an offender of extremes, those rifts had secretly been put to use.

( _"Be thankful that our Bifrost allows traversing the universe without fear of these fissures, Loki." Odin's tone was as grave as usual whenever he spoke to Loki about the abnormalities of Yggdrasil. Loki was young, and still watched his father's face hesitantly with admiration._

 _"_ _Some are deadlier to enter than others, and only the most powerful creatures can hope to survive inside those. Unfortunately, these creatures tend to be of the worse kind.")_

Odin had always banned anything from leaving Asgard into the unknown space between worlds if it contained Asgardian magic. It was to stop anyone who found the object from using the magic to trace their way to the realm. But even if Loki's handcuffs, inlaid with Asgardian magic to keep Loki's own power out of his reach, did not exit with him, Loki himself could still direct or lead anyone back to the realm. Odin knew that. So when the shackles flew off Loki's wrists and ankles as he fell – he saw them soaring purposefully back up to the Allfather's iron-clad fist – he knew he was supposed to die very soon.

(Another person dead who possibly stood a chance of mattering to Thor, and the only one who ruined it – )

Probably the Allfather aimed to send him into a crack that had no space inside. Or into one in which time passed so swiftly Loki would age and die before he even appreciated that he was allowed to grow old. The moment his bindings vanished, Loki grasped for his magic –

– and wove it around Odin's –

– then _twisted_ …

Despite the constant, sickening spiraling of his fall, he could sense his course had changed.

The darkness shifted –

And he got the sensation of being swallowed

by more darkness,

and then he felt his descent come to an abrupt halt.

For a moment, he wondered what his fall to Hel would be like.

He would have been more frightened if he did not know that he was now caught inside one of Yggdrasil's common cracks. As it was, he was simply very, very wary.

The blackness that enveloped him was not any less concentrated than before. It was still so thick that Loki felt nearly suffocated, despite the complete lack of solid surroundings. The kind of darkness that seemed to muffle all sound, slow every movement with caution and spark a hysterical longing for light – any light, just something to break up the stifling gloom, even a ghost of angry lightning from Thor. The space around him seemed to pulsate with an invisible current yet was strangely still at the same time. Considering he was still in one solid piece, he must have managed to redirect himself into a rift with at least some space inside.

The lack of gravity or direction was also disarming. There was no telling if he was right-side-up relative to how Thor must be standing right now, not even the pounding rush of blood to his head.

 _Well, Loki_. He almost rolled his eyes. _Try getting yourself out of this one._

It was different from when he had plummeted into the black hole, into Thanos' hands. He had easily orientated himself, with feet on solid ground. At least back then he could _see_. Summoning more magic, he focused on trying to enhance his sight in the blackness. But even before he began attempting the spell, he felt a resistance.

So his magic was out of reach inside the fractures of the universe, too. He supposed that made sense, since much of his magic was so tightly woven into Yggdrasil's substance. Yet another reason Odin had decided to condemn him there. Loki would have sworn, but he was not completely certain he was alone in there.

He had mustered the presence of mind to use magic twice just before he entered. There was now an illusion of himself being compressed into nothing, by the absence of space, inside a rift in the rough area Odin's magic had been aiming for. Loki was now also invisible. He hated anything that reminded him of his failed rule during Thor's banishment, but the spell he used to hide himself from Heimdall's watch was becoming more and more useful the more enemies he made.

Enemies. Loki had to wonder, in these dubious fragments of the universe…

Could Thanos find him there?

Loki swallowed. He would have closed his eyes too if it were not already so ridiculously dark. He pushed all thoughts of Thanos away from the forefront of his mind, back to the parts where lurked the things he worried about and planned for without relenting. (The parts of his mind that had grown monstrously, even more so since he fell the first time; the parts that could never sleep).

Even if Thanos could find him in these rifts, that would not change Loki's plan of action. He was already as physically invisible as he could be, and even more so otherwise, to Thor and anyone else who could possibly matter. He was as out of the picture as he could hope for. Just another felon in old S.H.I.E.L.D. records, and Asgardian history books if his wrongly told story even made it into those. And unlike Jane, he could be forgotten.

She had mourners on Earth, too. Reaching Selvig and Jane's other friends had been easy, and listening to Thor tell them of her death had not.

Close, _Loki decided when pulling he and Thor through space._ But not too close. _They emerged in a_ _tiny corridor muddled with coats and shoes. Voices, two males and one female, prattled animatedly in the chamber beyond._

 _"_ _I should meet them first," Thor said at the same time Loki murmured, "You should go first."_

 _Surprise and delight from the three people when Thor moved into the brightly lit room, before Thor's deeper tones cut in. Loki heard Malekith's name arise, but not the Kursed._ Will he just wait for her friends to ask? _Loki thought._

 _Then the woman's voice, Darcy's, asked. There was little trepidation in her voice, only confusion. It was like humans thought they were invincible once they had passed their first few instances with the otherworldly._

(Or maybe she had hung onto faith that Thor would keep her safe)

(She did not know she would have to factor in you)

 _"_ _Wait, what about Jane? Where is she?"_

 _Loki wondered what Thor's expression must be telling them, though Thor's voice answered anyway, leaving a silence that was louder than the Kursed's dying roars._

 _There were sounds of more despair. It burned Loki's ears to hear them, though not for the reasons he knew Thor thought._

 _Thor just said, "Malekith must pay twice now."_

 _And Loki knew he would never be at peace with Frigga's memory, either. Could never forget the night alone in his cell after the guard had loosed gruesome words through the prison wall._

(The Queen is dead…

Your mother is dead)

 _"_ _And… Loki is here. He was the one to slay the Kursed."_

 _Thor's tone had slipped into a dull monotone._

 _(The look on his brother's face when they knelt in the black dust)_

(He blames me?)

 _When Loki moved into the room, a woman gaped at him with red eyes through thick spectacles, continuing to swallow tears. Selvig and another, younger man each took a small step backwards. The first thing Erik Selvig said to Loki was a faltering stammer, matching his frayed appearance. In the absence of the Tesseract's bright blue light, the man's eyes were weathered, and a dull blue-grey. Loki looked to Thor, who stared straight back. Loki turned back to Selvig, keeping his expression neutral._

 _"_ _Erik. How do we start?"_

 _But all Selvig did was stare appalled at the man who had invaded his mind, ruined a city, and let slip away his almost-daughter's life._

* * *

Loki almost laughed at how this penance in a rift was much like the sitting-outs he and Thor had been dealt during their youth by Odin and Frigga. Time alone to think about the things he had done wrong. Maybe a life sentence was not long enough. Sitting-out had also required that he think of ways to resolve their disputes, and of what they should have done instead, but Loki had acknowledged before that he could not bring anyone home from Valhalla or Hel or wherever she went. As for what he should have done instead…

(Would Thor's heart be less broken right now if it were only Loki's body resting in the cave?)

Loki forbade himself to ask that. He did not want the answer.

 _You know the answer, you just don't want it._ He shook his head at himself.

( _For someone who easily tells lies, you are terrible at stomaching the truth_ )

Grief does such strange things, to both humans and Asgardians alike. But he had not expected anything different from friends of Jane.

 _In the little that Thor had managed to relay about Jane's killing to her human friends, Loki soon discovered how much more Thor had told them compared to what Thor had let Loki see paining him. Loki tried not to let that sting._

 _(But you already knew whose carries the blame in his eyes)_

 _"_ Wait _"_

 _Darcy's sharp voice split the air. Loki could have heard the promise of violence in her tone from leagues away._

 _"_ You _"_

 _She eyed Loki from across the chamber in their small house, stepping closer. Her stature and Midgardian attire compared to his was nearly laughable, if any of them could manage so much as a false half-smile._

 _"_ _You're the reason my best friend is_ dead _?"_

 _She shrieked the last word (Loki could nearly hear Thor's heart tearing anew), her face contorted in rage beneath her glasses. Darcy lashed out a hand to slap Loki as hard as she could across the face. It sounded like a small whipcrack. It was not even enough to make him blink, but Loki snapped his head back for her sake (Thor's sake). It made him recall Jane's slap from their first meeting._

 _"_ _If blame had to be placed somewhere." He said to the floor quietly. It felt sickening to play-act, pretending to wince slightly after her strike when there was deeper pain to feel, but it would be worse otherwise._

 _As he straightened up, he saw Thor swallow hard while seemingly staring out the window, as if the view outside was telling him some unfortunate but trivial news. When Thor looked back, his previous hardened mask was in place. By Loki's standards, it was transparent, but enough to quickly hide sorrow from the others. It would crumble to nothing when Thor thought no one was around to see what was beneath._

* * *

His time spent steeped in such condensed shadow was incalculable – possibly a day, probably only a few hours, maybe he was already dead. Maybe not physical pain but the endless sameness of this would drive him mad, if he was not already.

At first, Loki was tempted to assume the picture was his imagination.

But that would be a weakling's excuse. Loki's imagination, while powerful, was one of the few things he was in total control of.

He had not imagined that vision of Thanos flash faintly in the nearby oblivion.

Adrenaline roared in his blood, making his breathing deepen and electrifying his muscles. Given his earlier yearning for some light in the bizarrely intense blackness, he might have been glad that finally something had penetrated it. But he was not so far taken by primal wants – he still would rather wander the darkest rift than face the mad titan again.

The image was gone after a mere second, but was already branded into the surface of Loki's mind with burning pokers. The violet skin, the vast jaw, and the sense of immense _power_ that only gods and gathering thunderstorms could radiate. Strangely, however, Thanos' expression had not possessed the all-knowing air or the condescendingly cruel grin that Loki was familiar with. Not that it was a safe idea to think Thanos could be familiarised with. In that fleeting instance of _vision_ , Thanos had looked stern, and Loki did not particularly envy the receiver of that severity. He knew – he had faced – what would happen to them.

(They would be longing for something as sweet as pain)

Loki's brain filtered through a thousand possible explanations for the impossibly close sighting of his former captor. Before he settled on any, he heard him.

 _Remember, ally, it is in your best interest to not fail me_

Loki had hoped he would not hear that voice for a much longer time, not until he had discovered if his second fall from the Rainbow Bridge was indeed like that to Helheim.

It sounded like the mad titan was speaking to him, and the thought unlocked a gateway barring memories of the Chitauri, of the Void, of agony. The thought grabbed his throat and squeezed –

 _If you fail, you know I will hunt you_

 _If you succeed and return, I will make you nearly the most powerful being to walk these worlds_

 _But… if you succeed and run off with my Cube…_

 _You will wish you had simply failed_

Loki held still, though his heart was slamming frantically in his throat as if to try betray his whereabouts. But these words were wrong – he did not doubt their sincerity, but Thanos surely knew by now Loki had failed him in retrieving the Tesseract. Then –

 _Like my former helper, a halfling prince of Jotunheim_

 _Yes, Master_

Someone else was being exploited? Their voice was dry, like the sands and ashes of Svartalfheim.

 _Beware the one of gold_

was all Thanos' voice answered with.

At some unknown cue, the conversation ended, like the darkness had snuffed the voices out like candle flames.

* * *

The next thing Loki heard besides his own heartbeat was far less menacing, but it did nothing to calm his disquiet.

 _What have you done?_

Frigga's voice, from somewhere in the dark, was pervaded with shock, worry and, somehow underneath, affection. Loki's heart quaked at the sound, and then again at the fact that it could not be really her there, not with him in this hellhole when surely their queen had been seated on the highest throne in Valhalla. (If he did not know better, he might have guessed this _was_ Hel, and this was the beginning of his real punishment).

Then Odin's voice, exhausted but not old, soured the rift.

 _What I had to do_

The Allfather's face appeared. It was younger, hair and beard not so greyed, and in place of the gold eye patch was a blood-blackened hole. Loki and Thor had only ever known Odin with one eye anyway, despite their child selves' imaginations filling in the gap. But seeing this halfway point of before and after the war with Jotunheim was _refreshing_ – testimony of the history that Loki had questioned since his hand turn blue. It felt oddly like Odin was at last showing him some honesty, in a black space between realms with an apparition neither of them controlled. Loki might also have felt more sympathy if he did not hate him so damn much.

Like before with the vision of Thanos, Loki was given a brief glimpse of the Allfather, and nothing more. It was not unlike most of his encounters with Odin when he was younger.

Frigga's voice spoke back.

 _He is his son!_

Loki worked to store the sound away with his collection of other memories he guarded feverishly.

Odin replied, _Not from the moment he left him out in the cold_

 _I had to take him. He would have died otherwise_

( _Small, for a Giant's offspring._

 _Abandoned. Suffering. Left to die_ )

(But didn't you tell me that was my birthright?)

He realised he had been hoping, from the moment he had heard the voice, that Frigga's face would appear too.

Her tone was gentler, but still held a seed of apprehension, and a warning.

 _But Odin, if this is what I think you're doing with your enemy's child…_

 _We will give him a home, Frigga, and no more. It is already more than what his true father has given him_

 _That king was never his true father._ You _will be. You will show him nothing less_

The warning in her voice –

Frigga fought for him from the beginning. But there was probably no way to tell if these illusions were ever real.

(Loki would not doubt her anyway)

 _And you will be his mother?_

 _I would love nothing more_ , she said.

(So why did he let his last words to her be anything other than _I love you_?)

( _Am I not your mother?_ )

( _You're not_ )

Loki felt he was choking.

Another image: a bundle of blankets.

It moved weakly, until a tiny blue face was exposed. Loki watched as his infant self crumpled its face in distress. It vanished just before he heard a soft cry.

But he just ached for an image of Frigga to appear, and of course it never did.

* * *

 _Look at them, Odin!_

Loki basked in her voice again.

 _They do get along well… Maybe it will be for the best..._

He did not know yet nor care what they spoke about. He waited impatiently to hear Frigga again.

 _It would be the best thing for them_

She sounded delighted, and her tone was that of a mother and not a queen. Loki hoped this meant his past self was doing something right.

He caught a glimpse of two very young, sleeping children. The one with darker hair was curled up on its side, its head pressed against the other's stomach like he was listening to a heartbeat.

* * *

 _Tell me more_

Loki's heart jolted at that voice, though not for the same reasons Thor's heart might have, in the past.

Jane sounded eager, almost impatient, but also quietly elated. Loki had no recollection of whatever exchange this was. Unless his recollections of what little interaction he had had with Jane had been wiped out by that single memory of her in Svartalfheim, gasping on her own blood as she had stared at the blade poking out her stomach.

Then Loki listened as Thor's voice answered her, with the same tranquil, contented air. Loki had not heard him speak like that in years. He doubted he would again.

 _Well, there's Niflheim, Jotunheim, Muspelheim –_

Thor must have been teaching her about the Nine Realms. So this could have happened during Thor's banishment to Midgard, when they first met, or during Loki's first imprisonment. Loki imagined Thor taking time off from settling interworldly wars to crowd into Jane's Midgardian house, sitting with her at a small dining table and smiling.

 _–_ _and Midgard, which is Earth._

 _Then there's Asgard, which is where I come from._

The picture that faded from nothing looked golden and warm. It was unmistakably on Midgard, though Loki could not see their surroundings. Thor and Jane sat on padded chairs by a campfire, huddled over a book and so close together their shoulders touched. Thor was clad in human clothes like her. Even in that short flicker of insight into Thor's time on Earth, Loki could see he looked completely comfortable in them, and completely happy with her.

( _She has brought more into my life than anyone I have ever known_ )

It left no room to wonder at Thor's horror when he saw her die.

There wavered an instance of Thor pulling a blanket over Jane's sleeping figure's shoulder. They were at the same fireside, apparently falling asleep beneath the stars. Loki heard Thor whisper,

 _Thank you, Jane_

His whisper vanished.

It occurred to Loki again that he would be the very last of them, including Jane, to reunite with Frigga in Valhalla, if ever at all.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: Hello again. I don't know if it's a pain for you to keep reading me saying thank you for reading, so skip the next line if it is.**

 **Seriously though, thanks (:**

* * *

They still resonated in his ears, long after they had ended.

The mirages hung onto his senses like ghosts in unrest. They were branded onto the insides of his eyelids, so in the blackness he saw not only oblivion but also Thanos and Thor thanking Jane and no Frigga and a crying blue baby that should have died. If he wanted to save himself from eventual lunacy, from whatever the figments actually were, he should escape sooner rather than later. His escape had always been somewhere down the line. There was never any question of Loki actually staying in his time-out corner forever like Odin told him to. He could still be free.

 _(Freedom is life's great lie)_

And was he not the Liesmith?

Loki smiled without humour.

The Allfather would assume by now that Loki was killed in the rift he thought he had banished him to. Even if not, Loki doubted Odin had considered that any more than impounding his magic was necessary to keep him trapped in a crevice of space and time.

Obviously, the lack of his magic impeded his escape considerably, but Loki believed it could also be of help. He could not reach his magic when he was outside their universe, but he could still sense it. It was a pull – it drew at his core, most strongly felt through the thinnest parts of the rift's boundaries, wanting to tug him back into Yggdrasil. It was a compass.

Finding the thinnest places of the boundaries would not make it any easier to physically pass through. But, normally, his magic allowed him to travel by creating holes in space for him to step through – a needle slipping through folds of fabric so it bypasses the middle stretch of cloth and emerges on the other side. He had not ever used it to traverse _time_ in the same manner, but if he could just make his magic pierce this rift's thinner walls…

It took many frustrating attempts. Locating his magic on the other side of the boundaries was the simple step. It was nearly a part of the World Oak itself, and he only needed feel where its lure was most concentrated. He had always been so synchronised with it, more than most enchanters tended to be, according to his old lessons with Frigga.

But when he tried to coax his magic inside the universe into tearing an opening for him, Loki eventually stopped bothering to count his attempts.

 _Thor would never give up_ , repeated the quiet parts of his mind. Loki gritted his teeth for what seemed like the hundredth time. He ignored the pounding behind his forehead and in the marrow of his bones as he forced himself back into focusing. It felt worse than overstraining muscles from their adolescent battle training. Like the soreness was deeper, and if he were to work any harder it would begin splintering his bones from the inside out. He recalled many raised eyebrows and hidden smirks – barely hidden – when he was once foolish enough to mention the effort of practising magic. He laughed. None of them could have escaped this, then. Not even Thor.

But Thor still would not give up.

(He would think of Jane, and that would give him strength)

"I was not about to give up," Loki snapped aloud to no one. The surrounding oblivion answered back with nothing. He clenched his jaw and tried again. His insides ached.

(Loki had heard her gasp in agony in Thor's shaking arms. But she had said too, "I love you" before her heart stilled, and Thor had stopped trembling just so he could hold on to her like no one else mattered)

Loki knew. Jane did give his brother strength.

 _(And who would_ you _think of?)_

"I am not giving up," he said again.

(He would think of Thor)

The pain still grew inside him.

Loki tried again.

 _(I'm sorry, Thor)_

Finally, it happened.

What struck him first was the light. Before him, glorious white light suddenly split the thick gloom like an angel's hand pulling aside a black curtain. His eyesight had been stewing for so long in the darkness that the light burned. It felt wonderful.

His magic came second. Or possibly it hit him as soon as the light did, but he had revered the breaking of the dark after drowning in it for so long and so deeply. Loki had thought his confiscated magic would have left him feeling empty, more deprived than even the absence of light. A part of him was glad to note that it meant he was not as dependent on magic as he thought, then. Not as much as Odin thought, either. A smile twitched the corner of his mouth. But he relished the feeling of it flooding every fibre of him from brain to toes, smoothing away the pain. The hole in his being was suddenly filled – like an Asgardian getting their muscles back if they had somehow been taken away.

A familiar sound coasted through the impromptu doorway. Fierce wind, sounding familiarly glossy and rounded. Loki let the accompanying snowflakes pepper him, taking a second to examine the tiny ice flecks melting on his pale skin. They stayed whole. He nearly snorted at that.

 _You really were born from Jotun ice._ Loki savoured the sensation of the realm's wind sweeping the winter crispness over his cheeks and neck. It cut through the incessant surging of the space around him. But then it suddenly a reminder of the sharp, dry wails in Svartalfheim, and again there was the sensation of Jane spewing hot, thick liquid down his neck. (And red splashed the front of her dress. The sound of a blade plunging into flesh). He might have heard Thor's howls in the din of Jotunheim's snowstorm.

He wanted to rush through the new hole he had torn, leaving behind the stale echo of the strange visions and conversations he had encountered. Though it would mean hearing more of the tempest, it could also mean running to somewhere other than a prison alone with himself and his thoughts and his old choices and new faults.

But people fall when fleeing captivity only to realise they had fled into a wickeder cage. Now that he possessed his magic completely, he could hold open the portal for as long as he needed to survey where he would arrive. In the slash of colour he could see, the looming Jotun citadel and its neighbouring cliffs were an inky smudge in the distance. Up to the horizon, all else that met his senses were the pale, overlapping quilts of frost. Nothing else stirred besides the ever-present gale.

Jotunheim's layout mirrored Asgard's – the rest of the city encircled the palace like adoring disciples around their deity. The only difference was the temperature; Loki even hated both the rulers.

Sensing no reason to waiting any longer, he re-entered the universe.

The frost-laden ground was welcomingly solid, and stable, beneath the soles of his boots; nothing like being suspended in the stifling, roiling nothingness. As his magic stitched up the gateway behind him, he let his gaze drift around like the breeze and take in the dismal blue-grey shadows of the realm. The dazzling light that had first seeped in through his escape route had not even been particularly bright. He squinted and blinked against what was just the faint paleness reflecting off the snow, thankful for small mercies like not making his grand escape directly into Asgard. All that gold and precious metals would blind someone one day.

The winter gust played with his hair as he thought. His camouflage had slipped while in his makeshift prison, but he had pulled it back on before stepping into Jotunheim. He hoped the illusion of his probably spectacular crushing in a faraway rift had convinced Odin his not-son would never bother him again. If the Allfather had even been tracking him after he cast him out. But with his concealment in place, he was safe to return to Asgard either way.

 _Why would you want to return?_

Thor would just look at him again with that new coldness and still see nothing but Jane's suffering, and Loki would realise he should not have returned to retell to himself _why_ he had so much guilt tearing at his guts.

But Asgard had the Cube. And Thanos might still be after it. No, that was not in dispute. Thanos was definitely still hunting for it, with all his previous merciless resolve

(that he had injected into Loki, calling it _glorious purpose –_ )

Loki forced out a breath.

But Thanos might have another recruit – another puppet – to fetch it.

 _If you succeed and return, I will make you nearly the most powerful being to walk these worlds…_

The first of the rift's mirages still lingered in his ears, behind his eye sockets.

(Your worry would make Thanos smile, if he ever thought you more than a pawn)

It clung to his apprehension with the tenacity of the Chitauri soldiers' bloodlust, and he always recalled it with a sense of urgency. Those apparitions might not have been anything that had really transpired – for all he knew, magic existed outside Yggdrasil and had warped his senses. But what good would come from taking that chance? Gripping onto the hope that the titan was no longer hunting for unlimited power. He was Loki, he was invisible, and alone, and was still bound by an unrequited obligation to try help the Nine.

(Help Thor)

He gritted his jaw.

He could go to Asgard to check on the Tesseract. He could see if Asgard protected it as seriously as it should be. He could easily somehow put Odin on his guard against a potential attempt to steal it. To his knowledge, no one else knew about that possible exchange between Thanos and a new ally. That a tool of Thanos' was bent on finding it, or at least had been and perhaps had escaped the agreement (not that that was possible with Thanos… Loki still wandered if he would wake one day to find himself kneeling…)

That would do. That would be a good thing to do, to help, to help the Nine. He would not even have to reveal himself – should not, to keep up pretenses that he had died in his exile (he would not even have to see Thor look at him with that new coldness that made blame feel like it was stabbing him through his back and out his stomach).

So he would return to Asgard.

(Now he had an excuse to return to Asgard)

Loki started walking, leaving no footprints in the snow.

* * *

It was the same one he had used two years ago, to shepherd Frost Giants into the Vault to botch Thor's coronation. Loki slipped through the veiled pathway without so much as a whisper, and suddenly endless winter was replaced with unbroken summer.

Despite his magic shrouding him, Asgard's suns saw him and beat down as hard as they always had. Their rays, and the abrupt tumult of the city's clamour, made him feel like backtracking into the bland chill. His sight still had not yet adjusted to daylight, or Asgard really was just blinding. As he walked, he rested his gaze in the sparse shadows of buildings and busy people that chattered and strode past him unawares.

He was just outside the palace. Like the Jotuns had two years ago, Loki darted undetectably through the open court hallways, the cyan sky still visible as he went. It was probably what most Asgardians would claim pleasant day, but he wished for rain.

When Loki had entered through the hidden path, he had not missed the distant gold figure standing before the shining sphere of the Bifrost. Odin must have reappointed Heimdall as Gatekeeper. Their World Watcher would not have stayed jailed for treason for very long. The king had realised Heimdall was still their best chance at sighting danger, despite his recent failure with the Dark Elf invasion.

But one thing that had struck Loki as truly odd when he entered was that the city had already been entirely restored from the glittering debris. Even the palace itself, which had suffered the most of the assault. The only traces left of the attack were a few structural adjustments here and there. A row of pillars that had not existed before, an intricate silver fountain gone, extra training arenas and garden beds he did not recognise. The Allfather and his council would not have exerted enough magic to aid repairs that quickly, especially with Odin's weary state that Loki had seen last.

Everyone Loki passed in the labyrinth of corridors and chambers, he knew by title and formal appearance, but it was not until after he passed the banquet rooms that he saw someone whom he was more closely familiar with.

Her raven hair hung around her armoured shoulders carelessly, and her gait still hollered of her prizefighter strength. Sif strode alone purposefully, the metal heels of her boots kicking up sunlight behind her when she turned the left corner. Following her would no doubt be the best way to find Thor. Loki took the right corner, continuing his way to the Vault.

* * *

The absence of live guards hinted at nothing special in hiding.

Loki could distinguish layer upon layer of the Allfather's defensive, cloaking magic around the Cube, which was the closest artifact to the bars the Destroyer waited behind. It was near impossible to perceive that anything was even there through the wall of shielding energy, Loki only being able to because of his beyond-typical acquaintance with it. He knew it thrummed there, in the bubble carved by Odin's protection, glowing with barely containable power.

The other relics gleamed and winked at him as he paced the silent Vault's dim stone hall. Less powerful, but still devastating if only they were used properly instead of guising as trophies in Odin's toy box. Loki could discover how to harness their distinctive powers, fill in the gaps that were their unique limitations, and create a one-man army of himself if he were so inclined. It would be madness for the worlds, and that thought would have made him smile if he were looking for madness and not a way to hamper the wishes of the mad monster Thanos himself. Loki was not mad; even if he did employ every item of power in the room he walked, he knew Mayhem versus Madness would just demolish the realms differently to Madness alone. Not save them.

Not pulling out of thin air any more reasons to linger, he left the Vault.

* * *

He was halfway done with what he needed to do. All that was left now was to prod Odin into keeping special guard over the Tesseract. It would not be particularly difficult. A strong illusion – somewhere that Heimdall would see and hear clearly but without thinking it too easy – would be enough for the Gatekeeper's duty to make him tell the king. Loki could recall the conversation between Thanos and his unknown ally with perfect clarity. It was simply a matter of replicating it, somewhere off the edge of the Bifrost. It would not go amiss either to disguise himself as one of the Allfather's council members, urging Odin further to be wary of the Tesseract's whereabouts.

And that would be all. Then Loki could leave, leave without leaving any more marks on Thor's world.

He moved fast through the high-ceilinged corridors, no reflections cast on the glossy floors. Every time he followed those halls, he followed age-old directions, time-honoured since he learned to walk and as natural as the creases in the palm of his hand. Loki realised that Thor must do the same, whether he acknowledged it or not, if he did not get lost in his own home.

He had nearly exited the palace when he saw Thor.

Really, Loki could have simply continued walking to the Bifrost. Continued his plan, and ensure the Tesseract would be well minded so at least a move by Thanos would alert everyone. Then continue disappearing.

(But maybe, he could not have)

Loki slowed to a snail's pace. If he were visible, someone could have assumed him to be taking a leisurely stroll past the lavish chamber. But his eyes were hard and bright and locked on Thor, the Warriors Three and Sif in any way but leisurely. The sight of them was both familiar and completely new. They were making their way to the open ornate doors as tall as oak trees, which led to the training fields. Mjolnir gleamed in Thor's right hand as his blood-red cape swirled in the light breeze that came. To everyone else it must have seemed like a noble, warrior-like ( _adult_ ) possession, but Loki knew it from childhood. Thor had had a scarlet blanket and then a playtime costume prop before he had ever worn a real cape.

It looked like they were talking, while old, minute gestures made themselves known to Loki's attention. Fandral sometimes ran a meticulous hand over his flaxen hair, and Sif would give a tilt of her chin while Hogun shifted his stance occasionally as if in case someone might strike. Loki could have picked out a thousand different instances from his memory that matched this scene of his brother and his friends.

What was different was, obviously, Thor. Thor had been grappling with an emptiness so great Loki doubted even the Void could compare. It was still there, plain in his demeanour, his half-hearted smile, and Loki was sure in his heart too if someone were to cut his brother open and check. Loki watched Thor glance around every so often between words, almost absentmindedly like his misery was now just an item on a daily to-do list, and he still looked like he was scouring the world for her. In case Jane could be found, waiting in a sparring arena or beside a marble pillar or somewhere that was not a nameless cavern in a different realm far from home.

That was all still too easy to see, even if Loki did not want to. What was really different was how much it had aged his brother. It had been a long time since he had thought of Thor as much older than him. Thor appeared so tired, his eyes almost faded grey instead of blue. As if in the time Loki had been in the rift, Thor had also lived the years of someone else besides himself, or like he dearly wished he had. Loki could see Odin in his features.

There was a split second when Loki thought Thor saw him. Between two heartbeats, he thought Thor's eyes had settled on him in their wasted searching, though Loki was certainly not the one Thor wanted to see standing there so close and alive. Thor's gaze moved on and continued looking around before he returned to the conversation at hand, whatever it was.

Being nowhere near above some eavesdropping, Loki stepped closer. Though having been ignored all day by everyone, it still felt strange to hear their words flow on as he approached. No abrupt dying out of chatter or unenthusiastic glances in his direction. Their comfortable bearings did not automatically straighten and tense.

Thor's friends obviously knew about Jane. Loki could pick it out in the unusual softness in Sif's voice, and the subdued tinge to Fandral's normally carefree smile.

Evidently they were discussing some kind of forthcoming mission.

Sif was saying, " – and Heimdall will begin transporting my troops at sunrise."

Loki frowned. Puzzlement trickled into him, slowly at first. _Her troops?_

Thor replied, "Take Gungnir when you go. Show them Asgard's monarchical power extends to its army generals too."

 _How could Thor bequest Odin's spear to Sif?_ Loki was not unfamiliar with Thor's friends surpassing him in official ranks besides royalty, but Sif – all of them – had been a prisoner for treason not too long ago. Even Odin was not so forgiving, except when it came to Thor.

"Of course."

 _And_ when _had Sif been apparently declared General?_

Loki wished he had begun eavesdropping sooner.

(Something had felt wrong the moment he had seen the reassembled city)

"Gungnir _may_ need to be wielded by our other military leaders at some near point in time, Thor, instead of always Sif." Fandral interjected.

 _How long has this been happening?_

Fandral continued, "I know you want to show everyone Asgard's hierarchy is not so vertical, but using the royal weapon also makes Sif seem almost like your Queen."

The stiffening of the atmosphere was nearly undetectable, like a distant stone door had been closed. Thor's expression was tight, no longer lost in searching and more like he knew without hope what he looked for could not be found so easily. Fandral looked like he wanted to bite his tongue out, while Sif, Hogun and Volstagg stood back with something akin to sympathy and caution. Sif blinked away to stare fixedly at the partners sparring outside in the dirt as though it was a captivating pantomime.

Loki had never been blind to Sif's affection towards his brother. Newly emerging, but not newly blossomed. Jane's secret feelings of intimidation. And they all knew Thor's politely expressed preference. If Thor would become king, Sif would be his closest advisor, his uppermost military leader, and not his Queen.

(Loki could almost hear Thor thinking it. _I could never have a Queen, not anyone if not her, a mortal this realm would never accept as a valued citizen, much less a beloved leader…_ )

"I take your advice well, Fandral." Thor said. "It would indeed be wise if others brandished Gungnir soon. But only Sif and her legion shall take this operation, and it will go much more smoothly than without it." He may as well have roared aloud in his pain like he had when Jane's body was bloodied. Despite their penchant for reading everything no deeper than a lake surface, Loki knew Thor's friends beheld his underlying heartache as though Thor was openly weeping.

(For a selfish moment, Loki let himself dare hope there had been instances like this when he had first fallen, too)

"As you wish, my friend." Fandral murmured.

"I must give further instruction to my teams while they finish their preparations for tomorrow." Sif broke the fragile moment with hard fact. "If you two could spare a half hour to help me. " She nodded to Volstagg and Hogun. They left with her without another word, leaving the silence to resettle.

If Loki cared for Thor's friends enough, it would have been embarrassing watching them struggle with the tact they had always forwent in favour of battle cries. Fandral and Thor stood in the tawny shade of the palace doors, not venturing beyond in case the outside found what breakability existed in its God of Thunder. Loki wondered if Thor had even noticed the rain had begun to fall.

Droplets worshipped their feet, speckling the sand outside dark brown before turning the realm into a blur. Loki knew some people romanticised the rainstorms. They did not truly know Thor's, then. This was just a lamentation.

"Thor," Fandral began. It was another new experience, hearing Fandral speak so sensitively. He had not raised his hand to his hair or his moustache in an unusually long while, letting vanity slip by as his attention was pinned to Thor. But Loki did not feel the same need to give them space as he had for Jane's last breaths. He needed as much information as he could gather, and Thor was not losing anyone this time – just being reminded that he had.

"It's clear to us you still grieve."

There was a sinking in Loki's stomach, like Fandral's words were heavier than Loki realised and were tied to his insides. Rather, one word.

 _'_ _Still'… It's been a day at the most since Thor lost Jane._

 _As far as I know._

Thor was nodding wearily like he knew. This was even more troubling.

 _Clearly what I know now is not far enough._

(Or perhaps Thor's mourning over Loki's first fall from the bridge had been so fleeting that Jane's absence had felt like a lifetime)

Something had happened, evidently, that caused great change in Asgard while Loki was in banishment. Loki detested lacking crucial information, especially being the apparently last one to get it.

But Fandral's reference to _us_ was undoubtedly the same tight circle of four that that had always existed around Thor. Thor looked at him. Not distantly as he had with Loki, but as vulnerably as if Fandral was tossing a coin between delivering salvation or further torture.

"You still grieve deeply for Jane Foster and for your family."

The terrible fragility that surfaced in Thor's eyes was what made Loki feel like he should not be there. He had always prided himself on knowing things that others tried to hide, but Thor would bruise himself to hide it from Loki. Like the effort it took his older brother to disguise his emotions for once was a pain in itself.

Fandral continued, after hesitating. He looked apologetic. "So you should speak of it to us. We're your friends. You're so laden with responsibility, you will fold beneath it one day if you don't some share of your other burdens with us."

A shadow of guilt passed over Thor's face. It made him seem even wearier. "You have my apologies, Fandral, if I have let my own troubles influence my obligations to the kingdom. You are right… I will try more in future. It is also at the expense of the realm as a whole."

Thor drew himself up straighter, imperceptibly, but instead of depicting fortitude it looked like he merely recoiled from his friend. It reminded Loki of the first time he had perceived a moment of weakness from Odin, when Loki was barely a teenager. He had not really known what problem had exhausted Odin so, but he had witnessed the Allfather try to square his broad shoulders against it, Frigga laying a reassuring hand on his arm. Instead of appearing stronger, the motion had just stressed the effort it took Odin to appear so.

Then Thor said, "A king should not crown the rest of his domain with his woes."

* * *

Thor wished Fandral would stop staring at him so earnestly while they talked.

Not because Thor did not appreciate his friends' efforts at cushioning his latest bereavements, or their willingness to relieve him of any pains he bore. But every time someone eyed at him like that – his friends, his new advisors – Thor saw Loki.

Only Loki had ever really looked at him like that, like Loki knew something about Thor that Thor did not. It used to irritate Thor to no end when they were younger. Now it made Thor just want to turn away. He wanted no reminders.

* * *

King.

Loki would have liked to say he was surprised.

But it seemed too right. The way things had been between Odin and his heir, Loki did not think Odin would have granted Thor kingship so soon. Instead, Odin had finally slipped into his last Odinsleep while Loki was banished, and Thor had been promptly crowned after a lifetime of anticipation. Thor had been pining for the lives of several people.

It explained Sif's sudden rise to General, and Heimdall's quick reappointment. It explained why Fandral said _and for your family_ , not _for your mother._ Odin must be with Frigga now, and Thor could not have mourned a brother he no longer had.

* * *

Thor could tell there was more Fandral meant to say. His friend shifted before asking, "Is there further reason your unhappiness is so prolonged?"

Before Thor could answer, Fandral then asked,

(And Thor wished Fandral had not)

"Do you lament for your… brother, too?"

Thor could not tell if Fandral hesitated in raising another delicate topic or in giving Loki that title. Thor stared back at him for a long moment as the clouds wept outside, lamenting their own reasons.

He sighed. Not in admittance, but in exhaustion, because despite all the searching within himself that he did not want to admit he had done, he still did not know the answer to that.

"Possibly I do." That was as far as he had concluded since Loki had gone. "I would be heartened to know that he lives, and is safe, if it so happened that were true."

"But," Thor did not want to be there, with his loyal friend who needed him to be a king, trying to justify something he could not explain to even himself. "Something changed. Perhaps the walls he had built around himself had crumbled after he aided us in running Jane from Asgard. But even that was changed." _When he stood back and let her die._ Thor let the last words fade on his tongue, another truth for another day.

But it seemed the worlds were determined to force answers from him before he was ready to give them, or indeed before he had any to give.

Fandral asked, "Do you still blame him?"

* * *

"Do you still blame him?"

Fandral looked like he did not know whether to look Thor in the eye or look away. Loki could have told him extracting honesty from Thor would not need finesse of that degree. Even an idiot with their back turned could see Thor's heart bleeding out for Jane and the blood dripping onto Loki's hands, no matter how far Loki could run.

"No," Thor replied finally. Loki need not be a Liesmith to pinpoint the untruth. "I cannot rightly fault him for his actions in Svartalfheim, when his intentions were to only aid me."

There was a _but_ , Loki heard. And yet Thor did not elaborate any more, as if that were his complete conviction on the matter. Even when his tone, his expression, Jane's name on his lips so clearly cried otherwise.

Loki shoved the thought to the back of his mind for later reflection. He could spend eons probing Thor's logic, while Thor distrusted his.

Now it was Thor, not Odin, he needed to warn about Thanos' possible new associate and the Cube. This changed nothing. Loki could just as seamlessly trick Heimdall with his illusions of Thanos, having the Gatekeeper alert their new king. A councilman could still advise Thor to amplify their watch over the Cube.

There would be no need to ever reveal himself. It would disrupt the doings of Thor and his friends. Cause pointless unrest. He liked it when his mischief had some purpose. No doubt it would be quicker for everyone, better for everyone, if he did not.

And Loki did not want the one person whom Thor missed the least to be the one Thor would get back into his life.

The rain was still pouring as Loki turned away to head to the Bifrost. He did not look back at Thor before he left.

* * *

 **Happy New Year for later! I hope 2015 was what you wanted it or needed it to be.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's note: Sorry for the lag in updating! I mentioned this when posting Tying the Tangled Knot, but I'd been taking a break from this story (from writing more serious stuff) in favour of something lighthearted. Anyway, back on track.**

 **As usual, I hope you enjoy :)**

* * *

 _It's just like bad weather._

That was what their mother said

(Used to say)

whenever one of them fell ill, and burned with fevers that roiled their stomach.

 _Like bad weather, Son, it will pass soon enough._

(A cool palm on the forehead)

When time stretched them into adulthood, Thor admitted to Loki once that the mantra of hers had always made him feel worse, not comforted. He was Thor, after all, the master of storms. He was not to bow to bad weather, whimpering until it passed.

So Loki had absorbed that consolation of hers alone, with relish and guilt, like spreading out on a luxuriously soft bed too big for one person. He was Loki, after all, the master of magic learned from Frigga herself. He took little shame in more of her sunlight.

But he doubted even Frigga's comforting would entirely dislodge the sickening ache in his gut right now. He lingered outside the belly of the Vault, having ghosted the way from Odin's meeting chambers. He supposed they were officially Thor's now, but they could not be. Like a child trying to wear his parents' clothes without the hems overhanging his hands and feet, Thor had seemed so small as Loki observed him pace his father's old rooms like a king.

(Perhaps that was only Loki, because only Loki had really seen Thor so at home in his own bedchambers, before Thor had to bear the Allfather's crown)

(Or so at home by a campfire with Jane's shoulder touching his)

In Odin's old chambers, he had already watched Thor take in his words, coming from an advisor that was a mere mannequin of the air. _It would be best, my king, to keep special watch over the Vault until we can be sure the potential peril has passed._

Loki witnessed for the first time his brother wearing a strange, professional mask that they had never donned as young princes. It was more believable than the ones Thor had worn around Darcy, Ian and Selvig. Loki only sensed him hurting a little, as though Thor was just bottling up the fatigue of a tiring day, not an emptiness he clearly did not know how to fill. But Loki thought that if he stared hard enough or long enough, he would still see Jane's last look of suffering through the eyeholes.

(She was not his to care about like she was Thor's – he did not want that – but Loki wondered again how much fear she had felt, in dying)

(In parting from Thor)

Before that illusion, fooling Heimdall had been disappointingly easy. Not for the first time, Loki wondered how many others had slipped around their Gatekeeper's sight before. Asgard was a great jewel, after all, and there were more than enough envious thieves waiting between the limbs of the World Tree.

It was only a façade, Loki knew, that Heimdall wore in the presence of company; surprise never stirred the serene gold in his eyes. Loki saw no suppression of the Worldwatcher's unease, while he had spectated from behind his magic veil Thanos' words successfully chilling Heimdall to the bone.

 _If you succeed and run off with my Cube_

 _You will wish you had simply failed_

Watched the fear of failing the realm a third time flourish in Heimdall's heart.

 _Like my former helper, a halfling prince of Jotunheim_

The messenger Heimdall had summoned had looked young, and less adept at hiding worry. For good measure, Loki had followed her back, his blood so charged with agitation he realised several times he had to wait for her to unwittingly catch up. He had stopped just shy of Thor's door to listen to her fearful message and Thor's clipped thanks.

(Deceive Heimdall – done. Further warn Thor with an illusory advisor – done. Leave immediately afterwards…)

Now, he waited outside the Vault with disgust churning his insides at his own feebleness. He had let himself wonder, as the door to Thor's – Odin's – meeting chambers shut behind him, if he should remain longer to see that Thor carried out the extra security measures.

Loki had alerted Thor, and yet he was not already halfway across the universe to someplace that would not sour at his presence. He was not gone, to let Thor's acrid last memories of him be put aside where they could not sour anything else.

He was not gone, and he did not know where he could go. Somewhere that was not a danger to him, in danger from him, if he finally pulled off his concealment magic. It was ironic, the very magic Frigga had taught him in the off chance he could somehow stand out may not be used for much more than hiding.

But if he were not so weak that would not be so important as just _leaving_ – he just had to get away from Thor.

Loki was always terrible at goodbyes.

 _(So should this not be_ easier

 _If he did not get to say goodbye?)_

Instead, he was _waiting_ by Asgard's Vault for Thor to send a fresh team of guards that would, in all honesty, perish right after raising the alarm if Thanos or his allies came knocking down the doors. His skin felt like it was writhing as he paced.

But he would go for good, then, after this last item on the agenda that should have been cut much shorter. Then Thor could have that last bit of peace amongst his struggles of being king without his queen. Jane's cries still left a faint ringing in Loki's ears. The palace's filigree was dazzling, but he could not quite blink away the memory of Jane's agonised eyes. If this is only Loki's reaction to her final pain, what did Thor see?

They arrived within the half hour. A line of solemn-faced soldiers funneled past Loki wordlessly into the Vault. He followed before the door closed. Their leader barked a short order, the sentries filing around each other to form an ever-shifting web amongst the relics. This was good. It brought him the step closer to leaving unseen and unheard (unneeded).

But – the irritation at himself swelled unbearably as he thought it – should he not check the magic shields around the Tesseract too before he left?

Just to trial their strength. Most certainly an attempt to steal the Cube would involve some kind of magic, and no one else in the realm was skilled enough with magic to do it.

(After _this_ , he _must leave_ )

A simple attempt to penetrate the shields around it. If his testing accidentally alerted Heimdall and Thor, at least it meant the Cube was somewhat secure. They would not catch him there. He would tear a hole in reality and force himself through until he really was galaxies away. Loki gathered the energy that thrummed inside both him and the very air.

Only a single branch of his magic for this first inspection, which should not pierce the layers of Odin's magic by even a hair's breadth. Loki sent it flying towards the Tesseract.

He was braced for a backlash. A blade of light that would pin him to the floor until the guards slew him properly. A wave of fire to send him across the room before he charred.

 _What – ?_

It was more shocking that he cut through the protective bubble like soft butter.

Unmoving, barely breathing, Loki stared at where the Tesseract was veiled. He could sense the Allfather's defenses around it; if they were coloured, the Cube would be surrounded by a sphere of dense, blistering gold. But they were apparently as useless as a wrapping of wet paper.

What had Odin done?

 _This means nothing yet_

A feeling of cold foreboding crept into his chest.

 _Perhaps I will be unable to touch the Cube itself_

He could practically hear it radiating with cold energy.

Loki did not think he would come so close to unlimited power twice in his lifetime, nor that he would be wishing he _could_ _not_ the second time. He lifted the Cube off its steel cradle effortlessly. He prodded it, rotated it, floated it around behind its shields until he was sure he could have drawn it straight out and into his arms. All of this without, as far as he could tell, an alarm of any kind being set off.

And then he could feel the shields around it _fading_ as he stood. Its light would bathe the other artifacts like a blue sun.

After a split second's though, Loki threw a blanket of his own magic over the Cube, just to keep it hidden from the patrolling sentries while he thought. He let himself hold it there, too easily in his grasp. He let a minute slip past, hoping Thor would come barging through the doors, Mjolnir singing with lightning, searching for the thief that could help Thanos bring about the end of everything.

The footfalls of the unsuspecting watchmen filled the silence of the Vault.

Icicles grew in Loki's stomach. He cursed silently. With Frigga gone, and given Thor's only rudimentary knowledge of magic, Thor had not realised Odin's defenses around the Cube must have weakened after the Allfather's death. Now Loki's experimental attempt at penetrating the Allfather's magic had crumbled them completely. The Tesseract was exposed.

(He could steal it so easily himself)

Briefly, he wondered what it would be like if he did simply take it, right then, and run. But only briefly, because he already knew – he would be more powerful than he had ever been. But more than that, he could move the Tesseract off-world, somewhere far away from any realm, any living thing that Thanos could snuff the life out of.

He could guard it better than Odin himself, because what had the old man done to hide it other than leave it gift-wrapped in the gut of the realm's most prominent building? Loki could keep Thanos from it longer.

Could he spend his existence guarding the Tesseract?

He did not know _why_ , but he knew from his time with the Other that the glowing cube was only one of several treasures that Thanos hunted, and each one a part of something worse.

What if at least one of them was held beyond the titan's reach? Perhaps then he could not put together whatever puzzle he designed with those pieces in mind. It was unquestionably something bleaker than Malekith's plans to drown the World Tree in darkness. It would be a pure obliteration that nothing but Thanos and death themselves could survive.

Loki was not an idiot – he would not try taking Thanos on alone, whether with all the powerful relics in the Vault or not. The end of all things would likely spawn sooner that way. But he could hope that hiding the Cube would work, at least for as long as he lived to do it. He could do that; help stop – or, at any rate, postpone – the total destruction of Yggdrasil.

Couldn't he do that for Thor?

(It would just be extremely lonely)

When has he ever not been lonely, anyway?

(When he was with Thor)

Loki let out a soft breath. He smiled thinly. He was glad he was invisible and unheard; essentially alone.

(I am Loki, and I am alone)

But he was not Loki for nothing – he followed the thread of forethought further, to its frayed end.

Thanos' assumed ally would most probably still visit Asgard. Despite Thanos' promise to cut only the strings of his latest puppet, it was not unlikely he would also lay waste to the realm, a thousand times worse than Malekith had, if he discovered the Tesseract's absence. Just because he still could, even without his plaything of immeasurable energy.

Loki knew. Thanos would subjugate something just to show he could.

(Loki's eyes once flashed blue)

But his heart was unclenching, because he must not do what he was willing to do.

(Hide it forever from Thanos

Live forever away from Thor)

He will find a way to reconstruct the relic's defenses instead. Slowly, as though it were profoundly fragile, Loki lowered the thrumming Cube onto its cradle. As he withdrew the energy he had used to move it, he left the magic that shrouded it from sight.

The oblivious, uninterrupted footsteps of guards were like the ticking of a clock. Loki sped from the Vault.

* * *

 _Damn it all down to Hel…_

He should have tested the shield the moment he stepped into the Cube's presence the first time. _Before_ he had manipulated Heimdall and Thor into tightening the security.

Loki's breath hissed sharply out between his teeth as he hurried.

 _Damn everything_

And he had prided himself so on his foresight.

(Thor had always relied on his foresight)

He could have easily fashioned his own magic armour around the Tesseract after discovering Odin's was failing. Without revealing himself. To guarantee the strength of the new shield equaled Odin's, Loki would have to rest his concealment magic while he worked. It cost him too much energy to sustain both, and they could not afford shoddiness in the face of Thanos.

(He could have afforded his failure in planning if he were _strong_ enough)

(It was good that Thor had never relied on him for that)

Only a few pairs of watchmen at a time had been patrolling the Vault before – a quick distraction, then some hide-and-seek behind pedestals and pillars while he cast the new barrier would have been easy. But with the additional web of guards, at least a half-dozen pairs of eyes would sight him the second he shirked his disguise.

And then they would alert Thor.

No doubt they may try to kill him on the spot – this was no particular threat to him. But Thor would still find out, and the less blood spilt along the way, the better, Loki supposed.

Of course, he could seek out Thor first, to tell the king about Thanos himself, and get his approval to do it.

Loki overrode the idea immediately. That need not be necessary. He almost shook his head as he moved through the halls.

All he had to do was bring the lack of the Cube's safety to the attention of another magician, probably someone in Thor's council. Thor would prefer they handled it, and he would trust them.

Loki abruptly faltered in the middle of a bare corridor. He cursed loudly, tiredly. A pair of maidservants glided past, prattling about their day's plans.

 _But_ nobody _on Thor's council, in all of the citadel's staff,_ could _handle it. With Frigga gone, with Thor as king, only the Healers and the Gatekeeper had any significant grasp of magic, and nothing close to what was required at that. Frigga, if she were here, would have backed up Odin's lapse. Solved the problem as she had healed scrapes on their knees and wiped tears from their cheeks when they were younger._

He was still in the deserted corridor, motionless.

 _Frigga, sometimes I forget you were mother to the whole realm, too_

* * *

 _She rubbed his thin hand between hers. She was smiling, proud. He glowed._

Did you know you are stronger than me now?

 _Loki tilted his head at her, shaking his head. He did not know, because it would not be true. Their mother was the sun._

In most branches of magic, you are

And you understand subtleties in them that not even Odin can grasp yet

 _Loki shook his head stubbornly. Not Father._

I am proud of you

Thank you, Mother…

 _Her smile softened_

But you must be proud of yourself, too

(I'll try)

(I know you do)

* * *

Loki laughed at the stupidity of it. His laughter did not echo, with no form to bounce it off the hard walls.

He was suddenly the only one strong enough to do something, something important. But still not enough to do it _properly_ , without causing someone _difficulty_ , because now

Now it means he must show himself, to Thor.

Could he not leave his brother in peace? Thor already thought him as good as dead, like the first time Loki had fallen off the bridge when he had had _Jane_ to love, Jane to search for, to get him through. The second time, Thor had already made peace with it, had had Jane to love, Jane to hopelessly search for, to fill what little hole Loki's absence had left in him.

If Loki had only done all this _right_ , he could have finished his part in preserving Yggdrasil from Thanos' wake, and then he could have let Thor go. Thor would have continued his kingship, his Avenging, his healing over Frigga and Odin and Jane. But of all losses Thor had suffered, it would be _Loki_ that was given back to him.

Not for the first time, Loki cursed Odin's name.

 _You old, old fool_

 _Did you not think your magic would fail when you finally left?_

 _Did you assume you would live forever?_

 _(_ But Odin had told him, _we are not gods._

 _We're born_

 _We live_

 _We die_

Just as Jane did _)_

 _Or did you assume no one would dare cross you even after your five thousand years were up?_

Loki hated himself for letting something so simple lead to doing _this._ He hated himself for apparently already deciding to do it before he had even thought it all through,

because he moved through the labyrinth of hallways with no hesitation and found himself outside the entrance to the king's meeting chambers. He used to think these doors and the guards that flanked them so dauntingly large. He realised he would now barely need to reach up to touch the door handles, and he loomed over the guards who stood there currently.

 _(These are my meeting rooms, Loki, and are no place for a child when they are in use_

 _Come here only if you have urgent knowledge about the kingdom to share with your mother or I)_

 _(Yes, Father)_

Loki was no child now, and the Alllfather was beyond making use of what information he bore.

He could hear voices blathering behind the closed doors. He wondered who was arguing with Thor.

This was so different from fooling Thor with illusions to increase security, because now Loki would come as himself.

Would Thor believe him?

No, not the first time, without proof. Thor had a right not to.

He would just see Thor's disappointment in having him – and _only_ him, not Jane, or Frigga, or Odin – return.

(Things always went better when Loki was not as himself)

He retreated behind the last corner he had turned before arriving at the doors. He pulled on the illusion he had worn earlier that day. When he spoke next, his voice would sound higher, more elderly, with a slight waver that was not his own, and Thor would heed this mock advisor's words. At least, until the disguise faded to leave Loki standing there instead.

He shrugged off his invisibility like an old mantle, rounding the corner again. His new footsteps clacked mutedly and made his shoes sound well polished. His shadow on the wall was vaguely bird-like, with a hooked nose.

"One of the king's advisors," Loki bowed his head to each sentinel as he introduced himself. "I request an audience with him." The guards nodded politely, in wordless synchronicity.

When two men in silver-hemmed cloaks emerged from the meeting chambers, they still murmured discordantly, their voices low. Loki was no stranger to the councilors arguing. But he could not recognise the weary way Thor nodded to them on their way out.

Loki almost faltered. Thor wore the prim mask over his pained heart.

He could almost see the hole gored through her against Thor's own chest.

(Loki reminded himself: he was only another staff figure Thor must hide from)

Thor's eyes turned from the departing backs of his councilors to Loki, and flickered with surprise. Distant apprehension suddenly loomed in the air around Thor as Loki watched him recognise the advisor. This was good; Thor regarded the potential threat to the realms with due caution. This was also new.

"Your Majesty." Loki curled the stooped spine in a bow. "If I may, I would like to discuss the new safety measures in the Vault." This was the most likely matter to grant him a meeting with Thor the soonest, even if it were not true. Thor nodded immediately.

"Alffinnr. Of course. Please enter." Loki saw Thor muster more energy to inject into his words. It nearly ached to watch. The dark cloak Loki wore itched around his neck.

As Loki passed him on his way inside, he thought perhaps they were both latching tightly onto their composures, albeit for different reasons. He was suddenly so close to his brother again, after the stony silence between them in Svartalfheim, the battle in Greenwich, their separate condemnations from Odin. It was not the same as eavesdropping on Thor's discussion with Fandral or standing by while feeding him security advice with an illusion. Thor would be looking right at him, nodding and commenting. While he both fought with and clung to a long-aged sorrow that aged him wretchedly.

Loki would see this all easily as they spoke, and would pretend not to. Then after he showed himself, Thor would just hurt more, and would have more hurt to hide. Because no one in this place knew exactly what Thor felt, how Thor thought.

(Who Thor blamed)

The doors closed with a soft _clang_ that sounded like a locking prison cell. Thor led him to the ornate desk before a tall window that let in the sun. Neither of them sat. Loki doubted he could have willed his legs to relax that much anyway. They were tensed as though he prepared to flee, but that would come only later, if anything.

"Is there something amiss in the Vault, Alffinnr? Has there been a breach already?"

Anticipation tightened Thor's eyes. Loki had always used his ultimate goal in mind to justify any anger, worry or gloom that his lies caused for Odin, Frigga and Thor. Evading a needless conflict. Obtaining vital knowledge. Protecting someone who was honest and trusting to a dangerous fault. He bore the goal in mind whenever he lied to them. It rarely made it easier.

(He did it anyway. In some ways, he _was_ alike Thor)

"No, my king." Loki did not let his gaze wander curiously to the nameless documents on the desk or to the books on the shelves. This was supposed to be a place of daily business for him. He did not let his attention linger on how tired and alone his brother looked standing where Odin once had. Thor was to remain clueless to how Loki wanted to be both there and very, very far away.

"When I spoke of security, I actually meant not the recent additions to that in the Vault. Rather, the security related to that."

Thor looked cautious. "Explain, please."

"You keep track of the palace workforce," Loki said. Stated. To anyone else, Thor would be doing an admirable job of suppressing his confusion. But Loki sensed his puzzlement surfacing higher, like giant sea creatures approaching from below the frozen surface of an ocean. "The Healers, the messengers, the guards, the cooks, the general servers."

Thor nodded slowly. His eyes were still hard, but with mounting guardedness, like blued steel. "That is true, Alffinnr. Have you found an error in this system?"

Loki nodded. But he continued, "You also catalogue all members of your higher council."

"Yes, of course." Thor's impatience was beginning to wear through his composure, in a different way that grief did. Loki was partially glad. He had not realised he missed his older brother's old reckless energy, as much trouble as it had caused them in the past. Seeing Thor since returning from imprisonment had been like beholding the dying of the moon.

"Has someone slipped through these records?"

"Yes."

"Who? Are they a danger to us? Have they done much damage yet?" Loki swore Thor had twitched Mjolnir a fraction higher. But Thor evidently thought he could trust this advisor, if the portly man was so open about it. Thor had a lot to learn of deception.

"He means this realm no harm." Loki circumvented the first question.

"Why did he choose to come here? How?"

Loki looked at him. He bit down on the trace of imploring in his voice that had fought to be heard before (long before). "He wants to help you."

"How did he enter?" Thor repeated.

"You let him in."

Loki wished he did not do some things so dramatically. He recalled staging a grand entry into a German building on Earth, even wearing the mortals' style of formal clothing, and smiling as they screamed.

He observed the suspicion crystallise Thor's bearing like frost over a statue.

"Help me more, Alffinnr. Who is he?" Thor's restraint must have grown more than Loki had thought. Mjolnir might be pinning Loki to the ground by now – again – if this conversation had arisen a month ago.

Loki's mouth felt dry, even with this counterfeit body. He braced himself as if to lie, though he was about to show Thor the truth for the first time since arriving. He tried bearing in mind the ultimate purpose for this.

"Me."

Loki definitely did not imagine the jump in Mjolnir this time. But, thankfully, Thor's improved restraint withheld a strike. Loki held up his hands.

"But I lied not when I said I arrived to help you. Asgard may be in danger, and I can provide more information on how."

The look Thor was giving him now was so familiar, Loki nearly may as well be in his true form already. Thor looked distrustful. Betrayed.

"Then tell me now, and tell me everything, lest I have you imprisoned."

"I will. But," Loki's hands, craggy like bird claws, were still raised. "First I must show you."

As he spoke, Loki let his disguise begin to flicker away, like pale leaves blown from a tree by the wind. His voice was returned to his own by the time he finished the sentence.

Loki was ready for some kind of impact. A hammer strike, an enraged yell, a hand furiously shaking his shoulder. It would be well deserved. He would not fight back, only enough to stop Thor from killing him before Loki could tell him what Thor needed to know.

He was not expecting an embrace.

He heard the metallic thud of Mjolnir dropping to the floor before he was abruptly being crushed by black-silver armour and vivid crimson. But Loki felt none of his bones breaking. He felt the familiarly rough hand on top of his head and pressing his face into the crevice between Thor's neck and shoulder. Without knowing why, he felt his eyes prickle.

(He felt safe)

And then he was released, pushed back a few steps. He stared at Thor, who was staring back. Loki hated being taken by surprise.

(He had not gotten a chance to hug back)

A respectful knock sounded. The thick door muffled the guard's voice slightly. "My king, is all well? Has something happened?" They must have heard Mjolnir falling. Thor's stare was still fastened to Loki's face.

Then – inevitably, Loki knew – Thor's expression cooled. Hardened, as though he was realising only now who this was. And if what they did made who they were, then that might have been exactly the case. Loki saw Jane in Thor's eyes again.

"All is well, Gevaldr."

Loki heard Jane – her agony – Thor's voice again.

"Nothing has changed."

* * *

 **By the way, have a wonderful Chinese New Year! Or just have a lovely day.**


	6. Chapter 6

Hi there. This chapter is not an update. I'm really sorry, but I've decided to discontinue _What If?_

It might be in good taste to at least summarise what I had originally planned for the overall plot, for a bit more closure (not that I'm assuming this fic actually had a particularly profound emotional impact on you or anything). The summary is below the following apology and explanation.

It's been such a uphill, mind-numbing struggle for me to write, which I was no longer enjoying, and everything I've been writing for its next few chapters, for the past few months, seems awful and OOC. I felt it would have been worse to just keep updating it with poor content for the sake of finishing it. Hats off more than ever to all those writers who can weave such elaborate, in-character stories for us to enjoy, and I wish I had their/your skill enough that I could finish this story. I'm really sorry if you were looking forward to seeing how this would go (I was too, at the start), but of course deeply adore the fact that you had read and appreciated the posted parts of it. Thank you dearly and deeply for your support, whether you reviewed/Favourited/Followed it officially or not. Sorry, I didn't want to be someone who left a story unfinished.

 **Summary, post-Chapter 5:**

Thor is partially angry that Loki returned (and that Jane couldn't), also because this feels like Loki's defying Odin again, when Odin can no longer do anything about it (Odin is ultimately still Thor's father, in Thor's mind, despite the last orders he had given to restrain Thor and his friends). Eventually, through much wariness on their part, Loki convinces them to let him fix the defences around the Cube.

After this, Loki ends up staying in Asgard under the watch of Thor and Thor's friends, after much deliberation and argument - he doesn't want to really stay where he's not welcome, especially considering Thor's ongoing grief for Jane and their parents, but he would be needed in case of a breach in defences. Also, the idea of spending a lifetime away and essentially alone doesn't appeal to him. He never tells Thor about the visions and echoes of Frigga and them that he witnessed in that Void rift.

They knew that time and space in those rifts in Yggdrasil are stretched and squashed - eventually, Thor/Thor's friends say something that makes Loki realise that time had been much slower in the rift he had been in for seemingly only a day or two. It turns out five years had passed everywhere else in normal time, while he had been gone - it's post-Age of Ultron for Thor, now. Loki realises how long Thor must have been holding onto grief over Jane, Frigga and Odin, and wonders if any of that grief had been spared for him (but this wondering feels strangely selfish).

During the days he spends in the palace, Thor is no longer angry at him, but distant, as he knew Loki had not intended to let Jane die. Loki feels some blame towards Odin for this - if the Allfather hadn't punished them so separately, Loki might have had a chance to talk to Thor, even argue, about Jane's accidental death while the wound was still fresh. That would have been better than just letting it fester with Loki away for five years, because by the time Loki returned, instead of being able to talk and fight about anything, Thor had seemed to just let him go. It's kind of agreed that Loki is to fight on their side if they ever need, but isn't trusted.

It's lonely, for Loki in particular, although there are a few instances in which he and Thor almost are like old brothers again, like when they enter Frigga's room for the first time in a while.

During these days, Loki researches and thinks about the interaction between Thanos and Thanos' new ally that he had 'overheard' in the rift. He works out the images and voices that arise in those rifts had come from sometime in the past (warped time) and/or over great distances (warped space). He realises Thanos' ally would try steal the Cube from Asgard sometime soon. The "one in gold" that Thanos warns his ally of is Heimdall, who might see the ally approaching through the Void. Loki tries to tell Thor, who takes caution and increases watch on the Cube. The ally arrives in the Vault by tearing open holes in reality to step through (like what Loki did earlier to escape his rift), but Thor and his friends engage it in combat. They stop it from taking the Cube, but it 'teleports' away, taking Thor to the Rainbow Bridge, then pulling Thor down with it into another rift. Loki manages to fall through with them after taking the Casket of Ancient Winters with him as a weapon (the first time he's so willingly fallen from that bridge).

He and Thor try fight it in a rift. Eventually, they kill it, but Loki is injured badly. Thor calls for Heimdall, who eventually finds them and brings them back. Loki stays in a Healing Room for a while. Sif and the Warriors Three had kept the Cube safe. One year has passed, and Asgard has been missing Thor.

This was originally going to end with Loki dying from that wound, but I was thinking about changing instead to him living, but realising that again he is the only one of Thor's loved ones to survive, that Thor is again stuck with him and only him. He wants to apologise to Thor, but Thor has found some closure and says he's only glad that Loki is safe. That he has any of his loved ones left alive with him at all.

That was going to roughly where it ended, or at least that's how much I had planned so far. But actually fleshing out each scene was cognitively painful for me, so again I'm so sorry for not finishing, but thank you for taking any of your time at all to give it a chance. xx

P.S. I'm not quitting Fanfiction overall though, just this one story.

Also, thanks if you read this whole 'chapter' too.


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